Despite an overachieving, valiant effort, Coach Nate Bucher and his Becker Bulldog girls tennis team came up just short of a state tournament berth and finished in second place in last weekend’s Section 8AA tennis tournament. Becker dispatched the East Grand Forks (EGF) Green Wave in the section semifinals by a score of 5-2, before falling to Bemidji 4-3 in the Section Finals.
“I’m so proud of the way the girls played these last few matches. We had a lot of work to do in building a cohesive team with so much inexperience competing at the varsity level,” said Bucher. “The girls kept working hard and really started to mesh well when the time counted.”
Blue Downs Green
In the semifinal match against EGF, Becker came out of the gates strong and never looked back in picking up five match wins.
Maddie Moe was dominant in her #1 singles match, winning 6-0, 6-3 and teammate Ayla Brown showed determination down the stretch for a 6-2, 7-5 win at the #2 spot. Dani Nuest picked up the final singles win with a 6-4, 6-1 win in the #3 match.
In the doubles matches, Becker picked up wins in the #1 and #1 matches. Jazlyn Toedter and Julia Peterson defeated the #1 team from EGF by scores of 6-4, 6-0, while Kennedy Drehmel and Lily Anderson were winners in a close match, 7-6, 4-6, 6-3.
Lumberjacks
Becker would go on to face the Bemidji Lumberjacks in an extremely close match that would determine who advanced to the state tournament. Overall, it was an extremely close match, as the Bulldogs were the first team in Section play to give the Lumberjacks a scare. Bemidji went to the finals with a 7-0 win over Fergus Falls, a 5-2 win over Perham and a 6-1 win over St. Cloud Tech.
Becker detested Willmar 6-1, Foley 4-3 and then EGF to make it to the title match.
Moe again proved her worth to the team, as she scored a 6-1, 7-6 win over the top Bemidji player.
“The biggest upset was Maddie Moe winning at #1 singles versus Savannah Haugen, the singles favorite and eventual champion in the individual tournament,” said Bucher. “Throughout the match, the girls played up to their competition and really saw some of the best performances of the year.”
Overall, the Bulldogs were again tough in the singles events, with Brown winning 6-2, 6-4 in the #2 spot, while Nuest was again victorious 6-1, 6-3.
In the doubles matches, Becker was unable to come up with a win to give the team the ticket to the state tournament.
Despite falling short, Bucher was extremely proud of his squad.
“Though we came up short of going to state, this team played like well seasoned competitors and continued to fight until the end,” Bucher said. “Even when the match had been decided, Maddie kept playing her heart out. “
Bucher’s team will miss several seniors from this year’s squad, but returns a wealth of experience that should make the Bulldogs a team to watch next fall.
“The tears will come, but at least we have some hardware to put up, even if it’s second,” Bucher said. “We’ll miss our Seniors Jazlyn Toedter, Maddie Moe, and Faith Gott, but they continued to cultivate a culture on our tennis team of competitiveness, hard work, and high standard of character.”
Individuals
While the close team competition captured the attention of the tennis fans, there was also the individual tournament matches to entertain the Bulldog faithful.
Moe came in seeded as the south sub-section #1 player and quickly dispatched her Perham opponent, 6-0, 6-1. In the second round, she fell to Katrina Hansen, of Moorhead, 6-1, 6-3. From there, Moe was redirected to the third place match where she fell to Annandale’s Faith Simon, 6-3, 6-0. For her efforts, Moe finished in fourth place in the section.
For the individual doubles competition, Brown and Nuest teamed up for a comeback win against their EGF opponent in the first round, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2. From there, they fell to the eventual champions from Thief River Falls, 6-2, 3-6, 6-2.
Next up was the third place match, where they again scored a win, 6-3, 7-5. That win set up a true second place match against the #1 team from St. Cloud Tech with a state tournament berth on the line. In this one, the dynamic duo from Becker fell 6-0, 6-3 to finish in third place.
